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“I need to be there, Tyler. He’s my dad—the only one I have.”
Tyler pushes himself up out of the stiff chair and holds his hand out to me. “Then let’s go.”
It takes about fifteen minutes to make it to the house. Fire trucks and police cars pepper the road and the driveway leading up to Granny’s house. The same cop that asked me to leave last night is still on the scene. When he sees me approach, he immediately frowns and then comes to explain this situation.
The barn fire was finally put out just before dawn and the fire fighters began sifting through the rubble. The fire that started in the barn jumped over to the roof of the house because of the barn’s close proximity. They were able to save the first floor of the house, so not all the contents inside were a total loss, but there is significant damage to the house and it’s uninhabitable. It’s likely everything will need to be demolished and rebuilt because the structural integrity of the building has been compromised.
The worry of not knowing where my father is keeps me glued here.
My hope is that somewhere in the confusion of the ambulance carting Granny away, Dad jumped in there with her and is waiting at the hospital for me. I don’t want to allow any other possibility to enter my mind. There’s no way that he’s . . .
My mind trails off. I can’t finish the thought. I refuse to even entertain the idea that anything bad has happened to him.
As hard as I try, a million things still rush through my mind, but the one constant question remains at the forefront of my thoughts: Why did this happen?
When I try to get Tyler to talk about what he thinks happened, he clams up and just shrugs, reminding me that the police and the fire department will figure things out. I think he’s so closed off because he’s worried too, but I give him credit. He’s stuck here by me all night, holding me and allowing me to cry on his shoulder.
“Miss?” The cop tries to pull me out of the daze I’m in while thinking about all the things that could’ve happened to Dad. I focus my gaze on him, so he knows he has my complete attention. “The inspectors have recovered a body in the barn along with several animal remains.”
The words slam into me like a ton of bricks and my knees buckle. My vision shifts and all of a sudden the world looks farther and farther away until everything goes black.
The black coffin is lowered into the ground and it’s hard for my brain to wrap around the fact that my father is lying inside that box. Never again will I hear his voice or see his face, and when those facts cross through my mind I simply lose it all over again. I’m nowhere near ready to let him go.
I would do anything to bring him back—to hear his voice—and tell him how much I love him and make sure he knows how much he means to me.
I’m not ready to face this world without the man who has been a constant in my life.
There wasn’t a big crowd for the funeral—mainly just people he knew locally. I didn’t call anyone we knew from back home, except for Stacy, because most of them turned their backs on Dad when he needed them the most, so why would they be there for him now to pay last respects? I didn’t even call my own mother. That may sound cruel of me, but I figured if she hadn’t bothered to call and see if we were all right when we had to move out of our house, then she wouldn’t care enough to find out about Dad . . .
I sigh deeply. It’s hard for me to even admit in my head that he’s gone.
Granny sits in the chair next to me, gripping my hand tight while her other hand holds a bunch of tissues. She doesn’t say a word—she doesn’t have to—but I know she’s hurting too. Dad was her only child and she doesn’t have any other family, so I’m all that she has left. All we have now is each other.
Tyler places his hand on my shoulder and gives it a comforting squeeze. He hasn’t pushed me to rush out of the cemetery, but I can tell being here makes him uncomfortable. Now my father and his share the same cemetery as their final resting places.
I sniff and then blot both of my eyes dry with a tissue. I could sit here all day and stare at this hole in the earth, wishing hard that this was all a nightmare, but I know doing that won’t change anything.
As much as it pains me to leave Dad here, I know I have to. All of the people who attended the funeral have long since gone, and the guys who fill the holes in have been standing outside the tent, waiting for us to clear out so they can finish burying my father.
I let out a shaky breath. “Are you ready, Granny?”
She sighs and then nods. “We should probably let them finish up here. Don’t want to stick around and watch them cover him up.”
I shudder at the thought, not wanting to see that either. I hold my hand out to her and say, “Do you need me to help you up?”
She clenches my hand and slowly rises up out of the metal chair, taking her time as her lungs are still mending and she’s working on gaining her strength back. Tyler and I stand on either side of her, helping her to the car. When we get to the Mercedes, Tyler opens the passenger door and helps my grandma inside the car.
She pats his cheek. “Such a sweet boy.”
Tyler gives her a sad smile but doesn’t respond with words. Once she’s situated inside, he closes the door and then turns to me. “Are you hungry or anything? I could take you to get something to eat if you’d like.”
I shake my head. “I really just want to go ho—” I cut myself off, realizing my mistake. Granny and I don’t have a home right now. The local motel is the closest thing we’ve got. “I’d rather just go back to the room.”
He stares into my eyes for a long moment, and at first I think he’s going to tell me something important, judging by the expression on his face, but he simply nods. “Then that’s where I’ll take you.”
I let out a long sigh as he opens the back door for me, closes me inside, and then makes his way to the driver’s seat.
None of us say anything on the way to the motel. All of us are lost in thought. My life has changed so much in the last couple of months but Dad was always my constant—the one thing in my life I knew would always be there. It’s difficult to know that he’s gone. I don’t think I’ve even fully processed the finality of it all because I keep imagining that Dad’s just simply gone on a business trip and that any minute he’s going to show up and it’ll be like nothing has happened. That this is all some wicked dream.
